In anticipation of Wednesday night’s Powerball jackpot, many San Antonians are trying their luck at a local La Fiesta.
SAN ANTONIO — Wednesday night’s estimated Powerball jackpot has now climbed to $1.4 billion. It is the first lottery jackpot over $1 billion this year. Many stores around San Antonio have already paid out millions to South Texans this year.
At the La Fiesta on the 6100 block of Pecan Valley Drive on the city’s southeast side, some may say this is one of the luckiest lottery retailers. That’s because just this past May, someone won $3 million from a Texas Lottery scratch off.
“There has been a big uptick since that happened and more people are coming in and buying,” said Joseph Tinajero. He says since those big bucks were snagged this past spring, they’ve been selling more tickets.
“It depends on on how much traffic we get in,” he said.
With an estimated jackpot of $1.4 billion, if you take the 30-year annuity with yearly payments, you’d get over $46 million a year. Take out the 37% in federal taxes, and you’d take home over $29 million a year. That is in-state with no state tax on the lottery, like Texas.
If you choose the cash option, before taxes you’d snag over $634 million. After the 37% federal tax, your take home amount would be just about $400 million.
How many tickets will Tinajero get?
“Five. Maybe a little more,” he said.
Will he be trying his luck inside the lucky La Fiesta?
“I go to a store by my house and there’s a couple places on the east side that I go to. I know they’ve had winner over there too,” he said.
Ticket sales run until 9:00 p.m. Wednesday night, with the drawing at 10:00 p.m.